After pushing through the years of weeds and new growth we found ourselves standing next to an old, abandoned warehouse or commercial building. Despite being just a couple feet off the main road, I hadn’t seen the building.

  That was partially due to the fact that the weeds had grown so tall and thick they’d obscured the area, but it was also partially due to the fact that large sections of the building had collapsed. The previously tall sheet metal walls had buckled, causing the ceiling to cave in in numerous places, and most of the building was overgrown.

  The central part of the building, however, was cleaner than the rest. It was still destroyed, but the damage appeared to be a lot more recent. The dog walked up and started pawing at the rubble.

  “They’re in there?” Skyler asked in disbelief. “Why?”

  “Why can wait for later,” I replied, stepping up to the building. “We need to concentrate on figuring out if they’re still alive and getting them out of there first.” I ducked down, looking between the various pieces of debris until I found a slight gap. “Do you think you can slip one of your scout drones through here?”

  Skyler crouched down next to me and inspected the space for a moment before nodding. “I can try.” After standing back up and taking a deep breath, Skyler’s eyes unfocused, and one of the tiny quadcopter-like scouts zipped over and disappeared into the gap.

  Several seconds passed, and Skyler’s brow furrowed in concentration. “I’m in!” she finally declared, her face relaxing into a wide smile.

  “Do you see them?”

  Skyler bit her lip. “Unfortunately. They’re both pinned by rubble and either unconscious or…” she trailed off. It’s not like either of us needed her to finish that thought. “There are also antithesis corpses inside. I think. It’s more chunks than full bodies.”

  “Lovely,” I groaned. “Our first priority should be making sure they’re alive and providing some medical assistance. Then we can see about getting them out of there. Ideas?”

  “There’s no way one of us is going to fit through there. The path was barely wide enough for my drone to get through,” Skyler explained as she crouched down next to me.

  “Could we duct tape an inhaler to the drone?” I asked.

  “Even if we could, they’re not in the right position for me to insert an inhaler into their mouths or prompt them to breathe deeply.”

  {Athy: Healing nanites can be applied in a number of different ways; the inhaler is just the most efficient. I would caution you on the use of healing items before determining Pen-Gwen and Woofer’s states; some options could cause more damage to their bodies, trying to repair the damage despite not having the space to do so.}

  “You mean if their ribs are crushed, they may attempt to reknit the bones in the smaller space? That’s morbid,” Skyler hissed.

  {Arty: Most Class I medications cannot evaluate, only treat. Improper application can only be blamed upon the user.}

  “We get it, Artymis,” I whispered. “Is there anything we can use to stabilize them without

  knowing their full condition?”

  Unauthorized reproduction: this story has been taken without approval. Report sightings.

  {Arty: Nanite trauma injection. Twice as expensive as a regular dose, but focuses on restoring core functions.}

  {Athy: Before you consider going down that route, I have a better option. Skyler can purchase a slightly modified scout drone with a built-in medical scanner and injector arm to treat the pair remotely. It wouldn’t be much more expensive than a basic scout drone and slightly slower, but safer than injecting them with trauma nanites.}

  “If it has a built-in injector, then I can preload it with trauma nanites,” Skyler suggested. “That way if one of them is in critical condition, I can at least stabilize them long enough to arrange for proper treatment.”

  “Sounds sensible,” I agreed. “Are you going to do it?”

  Skyler nodded. “What are points when compared to people’s lives? Even if it completely wiped out my full total, it would be worth it to save the life of another samurai.”

  “Agreed,” I said, as I pushed myself to my feet. “Arty, make sure you take the price of the medications out of my points, so Skyler doesn’t have to absorb all the costs.”

  {Arty: Noted.}

  The front of the building had completely buckled, nearly folding in half even before the roof came down. It was going to take a long time to dig them out if we started from here. “While you do that, I’m going to take a look around the back of the building. See if I can find an easier way to get inside,” I told Skyler.

  She nodded distractedly, already pulling her new drone from the package that had appeared at her feet. The massive metallic dog, which had backed off and was now sitting nearby, looked at me with interest. “Stay!” I told it sternly before pointing at Skyler. “Protect!”

  “It’s a robot,” Skyler snorted, “not a real dog.”

  “I don’t care, as long as it gets the message,” I grumbled. The dog looked at me for a couple seconds more, then barked. I had no idea what that meant.

  “I’ll be back,” I promised before stepping away from the front of the building.

  I followed the cracked and faded sidewalk around to the side of the building, before heading to the back. There I found an old storage yard, long since raided and empty of materials, and an old, beat-up pickup. At first I thought it was abandoned, but when I got closer I realized it was an operational hover model. A second metal dog popped its head out of the bed in the back when I got close.

  “Is this your master’s truck?” I asked the bot. In response, it just stuck out its metal tongue and started fake panting. “Makes sense, you all had to get here somehow.”

  Since the dog didn’t appear like it was going to be much help, I wandered towards the back of the building. It appeared like this section of the store was mostly intact. Carefully, I turned the knob on the back door and pushed it open. The roof had collapsed inwards only a foot or two away, but at least the walls seemed mostly intact.

  I crouched down just outside the door, not willing to risk stepping inside and having the rest of the structure collapse. There was a gap under the roof, and not that much rubble. If we were careful, we might be able to slice up the roof panels and dig in this way.

  While I was inspecting, the dog outside started growling, a noise reminiscent of a very large motor, and when I turned to look at it, the bot jumped up and put its front paws on the front of the roof of the truck and started barking. “What are you…?”

  The turret on the dog's back opened up, spraying bullets into the sky. I dropped to the ground, covering my head as the mass of shells ejecting from the weapon rained down around me. “What the hell are you doing?” I screamed above the noise.

  That’s when the first Model One corpse splattered on the ground next to me. Then another, and another. Rolling over, I found a small swarm of Model Ones swooping down over the trees. Jumping to my feet, I drew Rending Wave, ready to cut down any of the flying pests that flew my way. Very few made it this far.

  Between the dog in the truck, and the one out front, most of the swarm was cut down before it even got close. A couple stray fliers did make it through, but a quick swipe of my sword was all it took to take care of them.

  After a couple of minutes, the shooting stopped. The metal K-9 sniffed the air a couple times, made a ‘humph’ noise, then lay back in the bed of the truck.

  I immediately jumped on comms. {Rei: You okay up there? Fuck that swarm came out of nowhere.}

  {Sky: I’m fine… besides the minor hearing damage of a machine gun going off next to my head. Glad the dog was here, I was busy running medical scans and didn’t see the little bastards coming.}

  {Rei: How are they doing?}

  {Sky: Heavily injured, but alive. I’ve stabilized them, but can’t apply serious medical care until we get them out.}

  {Rei: That’s fine, come around back. I think it’ll be easier to get to them from this side, but I need you to check with your drones.}

  {Arty: I hate to interrupt, but we have a problem.} My AI sent, interrupting the conversation,

  I narrowed my eyes. {A bigger problem than digging two samurai out of a collapsed building?}

  {Athy: Much, much bigger than that. That swarm of Ones was the first indication of a change in the horde’s behaviour. The antithesis are apparently tired of dealing with the government’s stalling tactics and spreading out to the north and south. Trying to bypass the impediments between them and the city.}

  A sense of dread washed over me. {Rei: That veritable ocean of antithesis is spilling down here? How long do we have?}

  {Arty: Minutes at best. Whatever you’re going to do, you better do it now.}

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